Accounting device.



Wi. B. SGHULTZ.

ACCOUNTING DEVICE.

APmcATfoN man Amma, 1913.

Patented 00h 24, Nm.,

M A2M, SouRcE M 2% l RATING /31 LMW ACCUUNTING DEVICE.

rescatar.

Specification ofletters latent.

Patented @et 2d, 191W.

Application led August 19, 193.3. Serial No. 785,455.

To all whom l? may concern:

Be it known that l, MAX B. SGHULTZ, residing at Weehawken, in the county of Hudson and State of New Jersey, have invented certain new and useful Improvements in Accounting Devices, of which the following is a specication.

This invention relates to cards used 1n an accounting system, and to devices to be employed in connection therewith.

A particular object of the invention is to provide a new and improved form of card to be used in numbers and be filed for reference in an ordinary card filing cabinet, the card being provided with means whereby a full and complete ledger record may be maintained with regard to a particular customer from period to period, Y and whereby a statement or bill of the account ma. be prepared for each period coincident wit the entry of the ledger record for that period, and in which a single ledger sheet may be employed for containing the ledgen record of one or more periods according to the number of entries for each period.

A further object is to provide a simple device adapted for continuous use in the keeping of accounts, that is, a device constructed somewhat on the principles of a loose leaf folder, the record or account sheets being readily removed and replaced.

A further object is to provide an accounting card upon whichthe record or account.

sheets are eXteriorly attached and held by a binding device, such as one or more rubber bands stretched over the card to hold the attached sheets in place, and to dispose such binding device so that it will serve as guide means for preventing the sheets of one card from telescoping or otherwise interferingA with the record sheets of the next adjacentl card, when a series of cards are inserted in a filing cabinet, or the like, the binding means also serving to preserve the written matter upon adjacent cards by holding them out by surface contact.

A further object is to -provide a card with a `portion upon which the name, number, and other information concerning a customer may be written, and to arrange this part so that it may be readily seen and referred to when a series of cardsare arranged inr a filing cabinet, and so thatfit will serve to identify any and all separate sheets which may be carried by the card.

A further object is to provide an accounting card as above, uponwhich an original record may be written and a carbon copy thereof simultaneously obtained, and to provide means whereby the carbon copy may be readily detached to be sent to the customer as a bill or statement of the customers account.

A further object is to provide means for preventing the likelihood of the carbon copy being retained and the original record being sent to the customer Aby mistake.

A further object is to provide the card so that a reserve supply of bill heads and record or ledger sheets may be carried thereon without inconvenience.

A further object is to provide means for maintaining a complete note of a past record of the customer.

Other objects and aims of the invention, more or less specilic than-those referred to above, will be in part obvious and in part .pointed out in the course of the following description of the elements, combinations, arrangements of parts and applications of principles, constituting the invention; and the scope of protection contemplated will be indicated in the appended claims.

In the accompanying drawings which are to be taken as a part of this specification, and in which I have shown a merely preferred form of embodiment of the invention: Figure 1 is an elevational view of an accounting ca'rd constructed in accordance with the principles of this invention, and illustrating the same in condition to be placed in a ling cabinet; Fig. 2 is a perspective view of the card shown in Fig. 1, but the retaining guide bands being removed to permit the application or removal of the record or ledger sheets and bill heads; F ig.l 3 is a perspective view of one of the record or ledger sheets removed; Fig. d is a perspective view of the carbon sheet employed; Fig. 5 is a perspective view of one of the carbon copies or bill heads upon which record was impressed at the time of writing upon the record sheet in Fig. 3; and Fig. 6 is a rear view of the card illustrating the past record table; Fig. 7 is a vertical transverse sectional view taken substantially on the plane of line Vll VH of Fig. l.

Referring to the drawings for a detailed description of the structure illustrated, L indicates the base or main portion of the card, which is folded upon itself, as shown, to forma pair of leaves as l and 2, a suitv'vertical columns.

able reinforcing piece 3 being applied to the fold or not, as desired. The leaves may, of course, be formed separately and be hinged together by the piece 3, if preferred. At the upper edge of the leaf 1 a lpair of tongues 4 are provided upstanding from said edge near its opposite ends. At the upper edge of the leaf 2 a single, much enlarged, tongue 5, is formed upstanding from said edge centrally thereof. The tongues 4 on the leaf l are designed for receiving the record sheets, carbon, and bill heads, as will be presently particularly referred to, and the tongue 5 on the leaf 2 is designed only for receiving the record sheets, as will also be presently particularly referred to. The tongue 5 is printed and adapted, on one side, for receiving the written name and number of "the'customer, the name of the party who recommended the customer, the rating of the customer, and other general information concerning the customer. Upon the opposite side may be written any desired shipping instructions.

The bill head or heads are indicated at G, and the record or ledger sheets are indi cated at H, the carbon paper 10 being interposed between them.

The record or ledger sheets H comprise each a piece of paper folded horizontally uponv itself and formed with three slits along the line of its fold, as follows: A central long slit y6 for receiving the tongue 5 when it is desired to place the record sheet upon the leaf 2 of the card; and endfslits 7, for receiving the tongues 4 when it is desired to place the record sheet upon the leaf l of the card. .Each record sheet is identical in all its printed matter, and each is provided with suitable ruling to define horizontal and The vertical columns are printed with suitable captions according to the nature of the business, in connection with which the system is employed.

In the present instance it may be assumed that the business is that of selling bottled goods by the case or demijohn. The captions then would read as shown upon the drawings: Date, beneath which the date of a sale or receipt of payment may be noted; Case, beneath which the number of cases ofA bottles sold may be noted; Dern, beneath which the number of demijohns sold may be noted; Amt., beneath which the price of the goods sold may be noted; 'Bal., beneath which the amount of balance due from the customer may be noted; Credit, beneath which the amounts paid by the customer may be noted; Returned C--D cases or demijohns returned may be nted; and Bal., beneath which the number of cases or demijohns not vet returned by the customer may 'be noted.

9 beneath which the number` of At the end of a period totals and other information concerning the account may be noted in any desired or preferable manner, but for illustration a relatively heavy, or colored line, 8 is drawn beneath the several columns below which the totals are noted. This may be done at any point in the length of the vertical columns and will be governed by the number of the entries in the record. The bottom portion of the sheet may remain blank to receive the entries of the succeeding period. In the present instance the number of cases sold, totals 23. The number of cases returnedv totals 16. leaving Y yet to be returned, which added to 6 due from the previous period makes a total of 13 due at the end of the present period. This is seen at the right hand edge of the sheet. The charge for goods sold in the present period totals $11.50, which added to $86.75 due -from customer for previous period equals $98.25. The money received from the customer in the present period totals $79.00 which deducted from $98.25 leaves $19.25 balance due at the beginning of the next period.

This information for the dealer is full and complete upon a single sheet covering all transactions for the period and showing a positive and clean result of the transactions. Since, by the act of writing the record upon the record or ledger sheet, the same is automatically and simultaneously reproduced upon the bill head in carbon, the bill head will also, of course, contain the same clean and complete record of the transaction for the benefit, and information, of the customer. Any errors may be readily perceived and corrected without difficulty.

At one end of the record sheet a space as 9 is provided for Writing the customers number, and at the other end of the sheet suitable space may be provided for indicating the salesmans number identified with the several transactions. The year number may also be indicated upon the record sheet.

It is, of course, apparent, that, while the drawing illustrates the record sheet to be suiiciently long to cover two periods of time, that is, two months, these sheets may, however, be made of any desired length or proportion so as to contain the record of any desired number of periods, or to contain unusually long records for single periods as the case may be. A heavy line as 14 may be drawn to define the periods.

The bill heads, and also the carbon sheet, each comprise a separate piece of paper folded upon itself in the same manner as the record sheets. The bill heads and the carbon sheet, however, are formed only with end slits 11 corresponding to the slits 7 in the record sheets, and being adapted to receive the tongues 4.

The oniigLD/Ofithe central slit 6 from the L- i incensi' bill heads and carbon sheet renders it impossible to aiiiX these sheets to the leaf 2 of the card. This being true, there is no likelihood of an operator placing the bill head upon the leaf 2 of the card and then carelessly mailing the original record sheet to the customer. O

Tt will be understood that the leaf 2 is adapted to serve as a means of retaining a supply of used or unused record sheets, and that a reserve supply of bill heads may be carried upon the leaf 1.

The bill heads may be ruled and provided with captions, etc., the saine as the ledger sheets, if desired, but it is not believed that this is necessary. The bill heads preferably contain the name of the dealer, and the nature of his business, and only such ruling as is absolutely necessary to the full understanding of the writing thereon. lln cases where the ledger record of two or more periods are entered upon a single ledger sheet, then the entries upon the bill heads for the several periods will be spaced more or less from the top edge of the bill head according to the position of the periods entries upon the ledger sheet. This is not objectionable, in fact it is of value in that it informs the customer of the honest and accurate method employed in preparing the bill.

Preferably upon the back of leaf 2 of the card is attached a sheet appropriately ruled and captioned for recording the amount of business transacted with the customer in all the past periods. This may comprise horizontal lines designated with the period names as Jan. Feb Mam etc., and vertical columns captioned 1913, 1914, 1915, etc. This is shown in Fig. 6, and in the present instance it is seen that for J anuary, 1913, the amount of business transacted with the customer was $15.00, and for February $11.50; This printing may, of course, be applied directly upon the rear surface of the card rather than upon a loose sheet, if desired.

Each of the leaves 1 and 2 is provided with notches 12 in its lower edge, those upon leaf 1 mating those upon leaf 2. The record or ledger sheets, the carbon sheets and the bill heads are of slightly less width than the leaves 1 and 2, and the notches terminate below the lower edge of these sheets. Binding members as 13, preferably consisting of rnbber bands, extend about the two leavesof the card, and about all the sheets, and are held in place by engaging in these notches and between the tongues i and 5. These bands obviously project from the surfaces of the card and, when a series of cards are placed in a filing cabinet, will serve to hold the opposing faces of adjacent c ards spaced apart, and so preserve the Writing which may be upon said faces. They also serve as guides to direct the cards into position in the filing cabinet without likelihood of injury to the sheets carried by the cards.

As many changes could be made in the above described construction, and various embodiments of the invention could be made without departing from the scope thereof, it

Ais intended that all matter contained in the above description, or shown in the accompanying drawing, shall be interpreted as illustrative only, and not in a limiting sense, and that the following claims are intended to cover all the generic and specific features of the invention which may be said to fall within the language of said claims.

Having thus described my invention what l claim as new and desire to secure by Letters Patent, is:

1. In -a device of the class described, the combination with a filing card, of a bill head carried by said filing card, a ledger sheet carried by said iling card, means formed upon said filing card coperating with means formed upon said bill head and upon said ledger sheet for detachably retaining said bill head and said ledger sheet in superposed relation to each other in one position upon said tiling card, and means formed on said filing card removed from said first means adapted to coperate with other means formed upon said ledger sheet for detach-V ably retaining the ledger sheetl in a second position upon said filing card, but there being no means for retaining the bill head in a second position upon said filing card.

2. In a device of the class described, the combination with a filing card, of a bill head carried by said filing card, a ledger sheet c-arried by said filing card, a pair of lugs formed upon said filing card, said bill head and said ledger sheet each having a pair of apertures formed therethrough to receive said lugs, whereby said bill head and `said ledger sheet may be detachably held in superposed relation to each other upon said iling card, duplicating means between said bill head and said ledger sheet, another lug formed upon said filing card having characteristics different from said first lug, and said ledger sheet having another aperture of 'a characteristic peculiar to said last lug', whereby said ledger sheet may be detachably retained in a second positionI upon said filing card, but said bill head having no aperture of a characteristic peculiar to said last lug, for the purpose set forth.

3. Tn a device of the class described comprising a card folded upon itself to form a 'pair of leaves, the combination therewith of a plurality of separately formed sheets carried by one of said leaves, one of said leaves having a pair of lugs projecting from the upper edge thereof adjacent to the opposite ends of said edge, said sheets being folded upon themselves over said edge and being provided with apertures for receiving said lugs to retain the sheets in position upon said leaf, a lug projecting from the upper edge of the other of said leaves at the approximate middle of said edge, and one of said sheets having an aperture for receiving said last mentioned lug whereby said mentioned sheet may be placed in position upon said second leaf, but said other sheets being formed Without said last mentioned aperture.

In testimony whereof I aix my signature in the presence of two Witnesses.

MAX B. SCHULTZ. Vitnesses;

L. Gnnsrorm HANDY, NATHALIE THOMPSON. 

